


Remembered

by Ruuger



Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Community: Paint It Red, Gen, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-12
Updated: 2012-10-12
Packaged: 2017-11-16 04:18:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 365
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/535409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruuger/pseuds/Ruuger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The grief counselor his doctor made him see afterwards told him that in time the pain would fade.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Remembered

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the October 2012 challenge at [Paint It Red](z13.invisionfree.com/Paint_It_Red/index.php).

The grief counselor his doctor made him see afterwards told him that in time the pain would fade. That one day, he would be able to look at pictures of his family and focus on the good memories instead of feeling just a paralysing sense of loss. Sophie said the same thing, later, before she knew better than to lie to him.

He used to carry a picture of his daughter in his wallet. A small postage-stamp square cut from a snapshot of a smiling gap-toothed little girl sitting by the pool. As much as seeing the picture pained him, the mere thought of taking the it out felt too much like a betrayal, and in the end he simply stopped using his wallet.

The night before he moved to Sacramento, he hired a small moving crew to carefully pack away every memento of his family he had - every piece of furniture he'd picked with his wife, all the toys he'd bought for his daughter, every photo and drawing and Fathers' Day card - and had them shipped to a rented storage space elsewhere. Boxed them away just like his memories, hidden in a locked room at the back of his mind, because for every good memory there was a flash of blood, a twinge of pain, and he found himself unable to tell the two apart. One day, the grief counselor told him. One day, said Sophie. One day, he keeps telling himself, one day he will be able to open the door again.

But nine years later the photos still remain hidden in boxes and his wallet still gathers dust in a desk drawer with the watch his wife bought him on their fifth anniversary (he could have bought new one, one that didn't remind him of her every time he looked at it, but that would have felt wrong too).

One day, he keeps telling himself on every anniversary spent lying under the bloody smiling face. One day, he promises, as he takes out the crime scenes photos of his blood-soaked bedroom and goes through them once more, looking for clues that he may have missed. One day, he will remember them again.


End file.
